So, I'm back. Did you miss me?
The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (aka North Korea) is one of the most interesting and unusual places that I have ever visited.. Over the next few weeks I'll be writing up my diaries of the trip and posting the edited highlights here. Rather than write it in daily diary form I'll post about the individual places we went and things that we saw. This is because it was without question the most packed trip I have ever been on. Apart from the start and finish in Beijing, not one minute of one day is left empty. When we weren't visiting things we were eating. When we were doing neither of those we were sleeping. To write it up here a day at a time would require thousand plus word entries that nobody would want to read. Those entries will start with the next one. This entry is a brief overview to set the scene.
The first thing that you need to know, if you have followed the automated entries saying where I was supposed to be, is best summed up by the words of our tour leader at the initial trip briefing.
"You know the itinerary that you have? You can put it away and forget it. On this tour things will change every day. Sometimes more than once. Everything will be covered but don't expect it to be in the same order listed."
He was right on all counts.
The general organisation of the tour was that we went everywhere accompanied by two guides - one man and one woman - and a cameraman who was recording the trip to produce a video to sell to us at the end. Opinion on the purpose of the guides varied. Were they there to facilitate our tour or to make sure that we didn't see or do anything the authorities didn't like or to report back to some shadowy control anything we said?
Paranoia is easy. Questions escalated. Were our rooms bugged? Was it safe to speak in the lifts? Who knows?
For what it's worth I think the guides were there to guide us - and that includes to guide us away from things we weren't supposed to see. And I think that a country having trouble keeping the water running or the lights on is unlikely to waste the effort needed to bug the rooms of a bunch of tourists. But what do I know?
I won't say any more right now about the country as I'd like you to build up the picture of it gradually, as I did, changing you opinion as the trip proceeds. I will say that it was the most fascinating trip I have ever made.
And that that isn't necessarily a good thing.
Entries here and on my photoblog will contain as many pictures as I can fit in.
The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (aka North Korea) is one of the most interesting and unusual places that I have ever visited.. Over the next few weeks I'll be writing up my diaries of the trip and posting the edited highlights here. Rather than write it in daily diary form I'll post about the individual places we went and things that we saw. This is because it was without question the most packed trip I have ever been on. Apart from the start and finish in Beijing, not one minute of one day is left empty. When we weren't visiting things we were eating. When we were doing neither of those we were sleeping. To write it up here a day at a time would require thousand plus word entries that nobody would want to read. Those entries will start with the next one. This entry is a brief overview to set the scene.
The first thing that you need to know, if you have followed the automated entries saying where I was supposed to be, is best summed up by the words of our tour leader at the initial trip briefing.
"You know the itinerary that you have? You can put it away and forget it. On this tour things will change every day. Sometimes more than once. Everything will be covered but don't expect it to be in the same order listed."
He was right on all counts.
The general organisation of the tour was that we went everywhere accompanied by two guides - one man and one woman - and a cameraman who was recording the trip to produce a video to sell to us at the end. Opinion on the purpose of the guides varied. Were they there to facilitate our tour or to make sure that we didn't see or do anything the authorities didn't like or to report back to some shadowy control anything we said?
Paranoia is easy. Questions escalated. Were our rooms bugged? Was it safe to speak in the lifts? Who knows?
For what it's worth I think the guides were there to guide us - and that includes to guide us away from things we weren't supposed to see. And I think that a country having trouble keeping the water running or the lights on is unlikely to waste the effort needed to bug the rooms of a bunch of tourists. But what do I know?
I won't say any more right now about the country as I'd like you to build up the picture of it gradually, as I did, changing you opinion as the trip proceeds. I will say that it was the most fascinating trip I have ever made.
And that that isn't necessarily a good thing.
Entries here and on my photoblog will contain as many pictures as I can fit in.
No comments:
Post a Comment